RAILWAYS. 77 



connect Mullingar with Dublin ; but extensions were soon made to Athlone 

 and Galway, and in 1851 the through service from sea to sea was estab- 

 lished. A number of small local lines have been since absorbed, and the 

 Company works several of the light railways which have been built in 

 recent years in the West, whilst the Irish Government has given consider- 

 able subsidies in order to induce the Company to make extensions of its 

 main line to several of the poorer outlying districts where the traffic returns 

 for some time could hardly be sufficient to justify, from a solely commercial 

 point of view, these extensions. The Royal Canal, one of the two great 

 Irish waterways, which runs from Dubhn westward to the Shannon, was 

 acquired by the Midland and Great Western Railway at an early stage of 

 the Railway's career. The Company paid over a quarter of a million for the 

 Canal, which runs alongside the railway up to Mullingar, and it is obliged to 

 maintain the navigation, and is not allowed to vary the tolls without the 

 consent of the Lord Lieutenant. Broadstone, the Dublin depot of the Com- 

 pany, is considered to be the handsomest railway terminus in Ireland, and 

 though the rolling stock is hardly modern, it is only fair to remember that 

 the Company does not serve any flourishing business centres like Belfast 

 and Cork ; things would probably have been very different on this line had 

 the attempt to establish a good system of steamship communication be- 

 tween GaWay and North America proved successful. 



The Great Southern and Western Railway has grown out of the under- 

 taking of a Company formed in 1844 to connect Cork and Dublin by rail. 

 The mileage has increased in the usual way by the construction of branches 

 and the absorption of smaller companies, until this railway now extends 

 from Dublin to Valentia in the extreme south-west, to Waterford in the 

 south-east, and to Athlone in the centre of the country. By far the most 

 important amalgamations it has effected are those in connection with the 

 Fishguard and Rosslare undertakings. A few years ago the English Great 

 Western Company commenced a small branch from a few miles east of 

 Milford to Fishguard, a harbour on Cardigan Bay. In 1893 and 1895 

 respectively powers were obtained to build harbours at Fishguard and 

 Rosslare (a point on the south-eastern coast of Ireland a few miles north of 

 Wexford), and to run cross-channel steamers between these two points. 

 The Waterford, Dungarvan, and Lismore Railway, which runs across Co. 

 Waterford, and which could be made, by two short extensions, to complete 

 the new route between England and Ireland was purchased. At this stage 

 the Great Southern and Western and the English Great Western Com- 

 panies joined hands and got a Bill passed giving them a general joint 

 interest and joint control of the new route and of the various works con- 

 nected with it, whilst in the year 1900 the former Company obtained the con- 

 sent of Parliament to an amalgamation scheme which included the absorption 

 of the Waterford and Central Ireland Railway and the Waterford, Limerick 

 and Western Railways. This latter Railway was an important line running 

 from Tuam, in the north of Galway, through Limerick to Waterford, and 

 by this amalgamation the Great Southern and Western — already the largest 

 Company in Ireland — -brought its mileage up to over a thousand miles. 

 This amalgamation has a more than local importance, for when the Fish- 

 guard and Rosslare scheme is complete there will be a route open between 

 London and Oueenstown via Paddington, Fishguard, and Rosslare, which 

 will be shorter than the present journey from Euston via Holyhead and 

 Dublin — a very important consideration, especially as regards the American 



